Carl Edwards thought he had won the NASCAR Sprint Cup Aaron’s 499 by the width of a rain drop. However, after a delay of three hours, 36 minutes and six seconds, David Ragan came back to steal the victory in a green-white-checkered finish.

Ragan had his No. 34 Ford pushed to the win by teammate David Gilliland in the No. 38 Ford from the tiny Front Row Motorsports.

But not before a huge wreck with five laps left that was ignited when Ricky Stenhouse Jr. tried a bonzai pass on the high side that resulted in Kurt Busch’s No. 78 Chevrolet flipping in the air only to come down on top of the No. 39 Chevrolet of Ryan Newman.

The cars of Stenhouse’s girlfriend’s Danica Patrick’s No. 10 Chevrolet, the No. 15 Toyota of Clint Bowyer and the No. 36 of J.J. Yely were also wrecked in the melee.

Before that Edwards, in the No. 99 Roush Fenway Ford, was just inches in front of his teammate Ricky Stenhouse Jr. when the skies opened and rain stopped the race after 125 laps of the 188 lap event.

Out came the Titan jet dryers and after two elongated attempts to sweep the water off of the 2.66 mile oval the race was back on.

By the time Ragan took the checkered flag flew more than seven hours had passed from the start.

So just how unfamiliar was Ragan and his team to winning?

Well, he and he crew had to ask a radio reporter how to get to Victory Lane.

Ragan said he was just simply overwhelmed by winning.

“I am kind of a long key guy,” he said as he was surrounded by team members and media. “I have to thank my teammate David Gilliland. If it wasn’t for that push from him I wouldn’t be in Victory Lane.”

Ragan acknowledged this was a moment he never saw coming; one that showed anything is possible in NASCAR Sprint Cup racing.

“Man this is a true David versus Goliath moment for our team,” he said. “This is special to get Front Row Motorsports their first win.

“This is a huge underdog win.”

Edwards ended up third in the No. 99 Ford with veteran Michael Waltrip finishing fourth in the No. 55 Toyota.

Points leader Jimmie Johnson rounded out the top five in the No. 48 Chevrolet.

It was another massive 15-car crash, 43 laps into the race that took out half a dozen contenders that defined the finish.

Kyle Busch got loose in the No. 18 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota while pushing Kasey Kahne in the No. 5 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet sending both into the wall and back down the track where car after car slammed into them.

Other top drivers caught up in the ensuing wreck were Jeff Gordon in the No.24 Chevrolet, Kevin Harvick in the No. 29 Chevrolet, Brian Vickers in the No. 11 Toyota, Greg Biffle in the No. 16 Ford and Tony Stewart in the No. 14 Chevrolet.

Busch took full blame for the massive wreck.

“I don’t know what happened,” Busch said. “I got to the back of the 5 and was going to try to go to his outside and he moved up. I didn’t expect it and tried to move down.

“I hate I caused a helluva melee for everyone. It’s way too early to be making those kind of moves.” .

FINISH LINES

In the season opening DTM series race at Hockenheim, Montreal’s Bruno Spengler finished fifth in the Schnitzer BMW behind winner Augusto Farfus in the RBM BMW. Toronto’s Robert Wickens retired with mechanical problems after only five laps in the STIHL Mercedes AMG C-Coupe. ... Dani Pedrosa took a dominant win in the MotoGP race at Spain’s Jerez Circuit for Honda with Marc Marquez second on another Honda and Jorge Lorenzo third on a Yamaha.

The 26-year-old Oakville native had lurked around the top five all day at the temporary street course in the Brazilian city before coming up behind and then passing Takuma Sato within sight of the start/finish line.

Sato tried valiantly — with what some would suggest was illegal blocking — to keep Hinchcliffe behind him but that plan eventually failed in the final turn.

“There’s no cooler way to win a race — in the last corner of the last lap,” Hinchcliffe said. “Takuma was making that race car really wide and he was defending the inside pretty well, almost too well a couple times.

“I didn’t think we had it. Going into the last corner, he overshot it. It wasn’t really until I crossed the line that I realized we got (the win).”

Sato gave Hinchcliffe his due and would not admit to blocking the No. 27 Chevrolet on the final two laps.

“Hinch did a great job and (my team) did a good job,” Sato said. “Today we started from 12th so it was a really solid day for us. It was a great, great race, and we’re carrying good momentum into Indianapolis.”